"The HOT 97 VIP LOUNGE is one of the best promotions I've been offered. It covers ALL the bases. It's a great sales tool, a great marketing tool, a great promotions tool. And our artists loved it. Word. They LOVED it. DESTINY’S CHILD and NAS. We did them back to back. And the one-hour broadcast you get AFTER the event is incredible icing on the cake. It's like a promotion that doesn't end. As always, HOT 97 comes through!"
-- James Brown, VP, Sony R&B Promotions
(for more on these great events… see below )
#1 ON WQHT (HOT 97):
DROP IT LIKE IT’S HOT / Snoop Dogg f. Pharrell
(Doggy Style/Geffen)
ADDS: BRING ‘EM OUT / T.I. f. Jay Z (Atlantic)
#1 ON WRKS (98.7KISS-FM):
CALL MY NAME / Prince
(Columbia)
ADDS: EVERY TIME YOU GO AWAY / Brian McKnight (Motown)
LOUNGE ACTS One of HOT 97’s most popular events is the VIP LOUNGE SERIES. Picture it: You and only about 90 other people in a comfortable studio. A free buffet. Beverages.
Then Angie Martinez takes the stage and welcomes everyone, then introduces one of your favorite artists. Angie interviews the artist, they play tracks from the artist’s not-yet-in-stores-even recording, and then a few nights after they’re taped (usually the night before the artist’s new CD actually drops), the event is broadcast on HOT 97. Why do I bring this
all up now? For one reason, cause I want to make sure all of our label pals are fully aware of what these events entail and offer. Secondly, I just wanted to recap some recent VIP Lounge events. In October, HOT 97 presented USHER (co-sponsored by The Finish Line). Thank you, Pecas, Joe Riccitelli, John Strazza, and our other friends at Jive. Then last month saw a 1-2 SONY punch as we presented DESTINY’S CHILD (co-sponsored by McDonald’s) in early November and NAS (sponsored by Phat Farm) toward the end of the month. Thank you, JB, Lisa Ellis, David Belgrave, and all our other pals at Sony. Pictured: NAS with ANGIE MARTINEZ during HOT 97's VIP LOUNGE at Sony Studios.
NEW CD101.9 FORECAST: A SLIGHT CHILL… It’s the perfect soundtrack for work, the drive, dinner, and entertaining. I’m talking about CD101.9’s new direction. In short, it’s CD101.9’s evolution… a musical revolution. In truth, it was probably the worst kept secret in the industry before the official relaunch actually took effect about 2 weeks ago. That’s okay, cause it was all good news and it’s been traveling fast. The station had already been seeing it’s 25-34 demo growing each of the past three trends (see below). And that was solely due to the new mix of music (in other words, this was prior to any official announcement, promos heralding the new direction, new marketing, etc.). Now CD101.9 NEW YORK CHILL is in full speed ahead mode. For more on the station’s relaunch, click here to read how David Hinckley broke the story in the NY Daily News:Download DailyNews-CD1019Chill.pdf For those of you in the NY area, tune in and check it out.
THE BIG CHILL SOUNDTRACK… One thing we really wanted to do in conjunction with CD101.9’s evolution from “Smooth Jazz” to “New York Chill,” was to produce a promotional CD sampler. One to introduce our new logo, our new look, and, most importantly, introduce the new musical direction the station would be introducing. Well, we did it. Some 40,000 copies were produced and are being distributed at special events, in clubs, at restaurants, and other compatible venues and heavily-trafficked environments. I have to take a moment to thank the labels that helped make this happen in record time. Believe it or not, we had to pull this thing together in less than 2 weeks! Our final product--which includes a CD-Rom component through which listeners can enter to win a trip to the Barbados Jazz Festival—features MR. SCRUFF (Ninja Tune), POSITIVE FLOW (Shanachie), STATELESS (Freerange/Ubiquity Records), SOUL BALLET (215 Records), GABIN (Astralwerks), CHUCK LOEB (Shanachie), THIEVERY CORPORATION (ESL Music), CHRIS BOTTI (Columbia Records), RE: JAZZ (Kriztal Entertainment), J. THOMPSON (AMH Records), BONA FIDE (N-Coded Music), and FLUFF (Lifted Music). A great taste of where we’ve been coming from… and where we’re going.
If you’d like to “experience the new CD101.9 New York Chill” courtesy of our compilation CD, please email me with your request (be sure to include your name and address). Please put “CD SAMPLER” in the Subject Line so I can easily group the requests. I'll try to get your sampler mailed out as quickly as possible.
CHILLY RECEPTION Recent trends have been extremely encouraging for the “New York Chill” format. Just look at recent trends for Adults 25-54 in the New York Market: CD’s August trend with this demo was a 2.6. In September it jumped to 3.4. And October climbed to 4.0 The new Arbitrends will be out this Friday…
CHILL—ENOUGH ALREADY! LET’S CHECK IN ON KISS-FM One of the hottest monthly events in NYC these days is Lenny “The Love Man” Green’s live broadcasts of his top-rated 98.7KISS-FM show, KISSING AFTER DARK. Recently, Lenny went live from the famed LQ
(Latin Quarter) with featured guests 112. On January 12th, Lenny’s scheduled to broadcast live from NY’s legendary Copacabana. And his featured guest… Grammy nominee JOSS STONE! Our current sponsor is CLOS DU BOIS wines, which means audience members are treated to free samples throughout the night (not a bad way to spend an evening). And as Lenny proves night after night on KISS-FM, no one can carry a 5-hour event like he can. Expect new artists, surprise artists, special guests, poetry, comedy, fashion shows, and plenty of audience interaction. So start thinking ahead to ’05 and let me know if you’d like to be on the guest list for Lenny’s KISSING AFTER DARK at the Copa with Joss Stone… Pictured: 112 tear it up--and get shown THE LOVE--during Lenny Green's KISSING AFTER DARK live broadcast from LQ.
WU, WHAT, WHEN, HERE’S WHERE… HOT 97 continued its monthly series championing unsigned artists at S.O.B.’s in NYC two weeks ago with a night celebrating the release 
of the BLADE: TRINITY soundtrack (New Line Records). The event ultimately attracted around 350 people. Early birds were treated to an hour of open bar plus clips from the exclusive DVD packaged with the BLADE: TRINITY soundtrack special edition. Our “breeding ground” portion of the night included sets by T-WEAPONZ (who gave the crowd a Spanish lesson), DUSHYANTHI (Hip-Hop meets belly dancing), and two artists courtesy of RZA himself: THE DIVISION and SUGA BANG. Then RZA took the stage and was ultimately joined by a host of friends, including GHOSTFACE and GZA. This has quickly become a credible and popular series. Special thanks again to The Alchemist (Koch) for helping us launch this back in September. To Jin (Ruff Ryders/Virgin) for taking us through October. And to RZA for blowing up our November event (also thanks to Kevin Kertes and Amy Terpeluk at New Line for making this special Blade:Trinity event--and all the giveaway items--possible). Pictured: RZA
We’re back at SOB’s on Thursday, December 23rd. Can’t tell you who the featured artist will be just yet. It’s a secret right now. Under wraps. In fact, I should just change the subject before I accidentally let his… or her, cause it could be a her, you know… name slip. [Quick segue] Wow! “Used To Love You.” Have you been digging that track or what? Love that song…. Anyway, 12/23 at SOBs. Doors at 7pm... We’d love to see more of our industry pals supporting these nights, so feel free to email me to get on our guest list.
EL DJ REY ESTA AQUI… HOT 97 joined forces with NOKIA and hosted a 3 week promotion at the massive CLUB EXIT in NY (currently the home of DJ ENUFF and his Heavy Hitters every Thursday night). It was a DJ Mix-Off Contest. Semi-finals took place 11/4 (a night that 
also featured a performance by RUPEE) and 11/11 (a night that also featured a performance by WYCLEF JEAN). The finals went down on 11/18 (a night that also featured THE INC, including performances by JA RULE and
ASHANTI). Special thanks to the members of the X-ECUTIONERS (and Q… and SEAN C… for helping to pull that together) for serving as judges. Hands down, one of the highlights of the whole promotion was on the final night… after the last finalist had done their 3-minute set… when the X-ECUTIONERS asked if they could work the turntables for a few minutes. What an understatement. The crowd went crazy as the X-ecutioners showed everyone how it’s done! They even had DJ Enuff up on his feet with the biggest smile imaginable. Big, big thanks to the X-Ecutioners! Pictured: X-ecutioners' ROC RAIDA shows some skills.
QUICK NOTES, MISC., FYIs, & ETC.… 98.7KISS-FM broadcast live from 6am-12m from VIRGIN MEGASTORE UNION SQUARE on Friday, Dec. 3. This was the station’s 2nd Annual Coat Drive. Over 13,000 coats were donated! In addition, the promotion raised more than $12,000! Special thanks to Chris Ward and Andy Moreno at Virgin Megastores for all their help with this! … 987KISSFM.com is doing a cool holiday promotion. It’s called the STOCKIN’ STUFFER DAYS OF CHRISTMAS. Right now, you can enter to win a Gift Basket from CAROL’S DAUGHTER. Click to check it out: Win a Carol's Daughter Gift Basket. ... Rafe Gomez hosts "The Groove Boutique" Saturday nights on CD101.9. But that's not all. Rafe and production partner David Baron recently produced a chill jazz remix of SMOKEY ROBINSON's 1975 classic slow jam, "Quiet Storm." According to Rafe, this remix will likely be included as a bonus track on a newe Smokey CD that's due out in March '05.
WEBSLINGERS.… The November numbers are in and they are THROUGH THE ROOF for HOT97.COM!!
- 5.5 MILLION (that’s 5,500,000!) MONTHLY PAGE VIEWS.
- 851,619 UNIQUE VISITORS (a 300% increase over the same month last year)!
- An AVERAGE VISIT LENGTH OF 11 MINUTES.
- On top of all that, the HOT97.com E-MAIL CLICK now boasts close to 290,000 members (a 36% increase over the same month last year)!
And 987KISSFM.com is looking mighty fine as well with:
- Close to 600,000 MONTHLY PAGE VIEWS.
- Close to 70,000 UNIQUE VISITORS
- An AVERAGE VISIT LENGTH OF 13 MINUTES.
- Nearly 57,000 987KISSFM.com E-MAIL CONNECTION MEMBERS
Be sure to check our the redesigned CD1019.com site, which now reflects the “NEW YORK CHILL" direction. Take a moment to join the CD1019.com LOUNGE!
And that’s it. Hopefully, this new “blog” is more appealing to everyone—and easier on your computers than getting those html newsletters I used to send out. Please let me know your thoughts (email me direct or click on "comments" below).
And have a GREAT REST OF THE WEEK!
chris
HOT97.COM’s November numbers:
